Fitness YouTuber Dies After Being Tased By Police As He Stabbed His Tinder Date

A sleepy town in Massachusetts is in the headlines after a 25-year-old man died while being arrested for viciously attacking his Tinder date. Erich Stelzer, 25, a bodybuilder who shared fitness videos on YouTube, died in custody after he was tased by police in Cohasset, Mass. The incident took place Thursday evening after Cohasset police received a call about a disturbance and arrived to find Stelzer assaulting a 24-year-old woman with weapons, including a knife.
Read more: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/erich-stelzer-cohasset-tinder_us_5c2957cee4b08aaf7a91a87d??source=Snapzu

The cow that escaped the slaughterhouse gave birth, and her new baby is utterly adorable

Just a few short days after her daring run down Route 80, recently rescued Brianna the cow gave birth to a female calf Saturday afternoon. Brianna fell 8 feet out of the second level of a truck headed to a Paterson slaughterhouse around 2:45 a.m. on Thursday night. She wandered around the highway until Skylands Animal Sanctuary and Rescue came to corral her.
Read more: https://www.nj.com/sussex-county/2018/12/the-cow-that-escaped-the-slaughterhouse-gave-birth-and-her-new-baby-is-utterly-adorable.html?source=Snapzu

Facebook Data Scandals Stoke Criticism That a Privacy Watchdog Too Rarely Bites

Last spring, soon after Facebook acknowledged that the data of tens of millions of its users had improperly been obtained by the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica, a top enforcement official at the Federal Trade Commission drafted a memo about the prospect of disciplining the social network. Lawmakers, consumer advocates and even former commission officials were clamoring for tough action against Facebook, arguing that it had violated an earlier F.T.C. consent decree barring it from misleading users about how their information was shared.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/30/technology/facebook-data-privacy-ftc.html?source=Snapzu

Lawrence Roberts, Who Helped Design Internet’s Precursor, Dies at 81

Dr. Roberts worked with other engineers to create the underpinnings of the Arpanet, making many crucial decisions. But his work did not make him rich.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/30/obituaries/lawrence-g-roberts-dies-at-81.html?source=Snapzu

Graham backs down on Syria after lunch with Trump

Sen. Lindsey Graham backed away Sunday from his criticisms of President Trump's decision to withdraw from Syria, telling reporters that Trump shared "some things I didn't know" during a lunch at the White House that "make me feel a lot better about where we're headed in Syria."
Read more: https://www.axios.com/lindsey-graham-trump-syria-isis-f98c28df-bd57-48d8-892e-e20532623c1a.html?source=Snapzu

California's Pet Stores To Only Sell Rescue Cats, Dogs And Rabbits

California is ringing in the new year as the first state in the country to ban stores from selling dogs, cats and rabbits that aren’t rescues. The Pet Rescue and Adoption Act, which was signed into law by California Gov. Jerry Brown in 2017, will go into effect on Tuesday, Jan. 1. The law requires all pet shops to identify the public animal control agency, shelter or rescue group that the animal came from. Such information must be on display on its cage or in its enclosure.
Read more: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/california-all-rescue-pet-stores_us_5c2912f5e4b05c88b7017ec7?source=Snapzu

Galapagos fireworks ban to save wildlife

Authorities in Ecuador say animals suffered elevated heart rates and anxiety after pyrotechnic shows.
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-46706515?source=Snapzu

A Holiday Mystery: Why Did John Roberts Intervene in the Mueller Probe?

A mysterious grand jury subpoena case has been working itself through the D.C. courts since August. Doughty reporting by Politico linked the grand jury case to special counsel Robert Mueller. Some of us, connecting the dots, wondered whether Mueller’s antagonist in this secret subpoena battle might be President Donald Trump himself. Speculation heightened two weeks ago when the D.C. Circuit cleared an entire floor of reporters assembled for the oral argument, in order to protect the identity of the litigants.
Read more: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/12/30/supreme-court-john-roberts-robert-mueller-investigation-223569?source=Snapzu

Trump used her slain daughter to rail against illegal immigration. She chose a different path.

The letters began immediately. Dozens at first, then hundreds, each day bringing more: from a Texas man telling her this was why we needed to build the wall. From a New York television producer asking for an interview. From an elderly woman despairing “this divided America in which we now live.” Nearly every day since her daughter’s body was found, she had opened the mailbox, then sat and read them, because that was her routine, that was how she tried to make sense of something so senseless.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/trump-used-her-slain-daughter-to-rail-against-illegal-immigration-she-chose-a-different-path/2018/12/27/084f93a4-e9ce-11e8-a939-9469f1166f9d_story.html?source=Snapzu

Sudan's al-Bashir tells police to limit force against protesters

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appeals 'for calm and restraint' while calling for government probe into deaths.
Read more: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/12/sudan-bashir-tells-police-limit-force-protesters-181230141219570.html?source=Snapzu

“Good White Men”

Like Nazis looking for Jewishness by checking the foreskins of prisoners, the identitarians of both fascist and social justice strands divine from pale skin and penises the indelible mark of the power to dominate. By Rhyd Wildermuth.
Read more: https://paganarch.com/2018/03/14/good-white-men/?source=Snapzu

States make climate policies a 2019 priority

Despite federal climate policy rollbacks, governors and cities have decided to take up the mantel on climate leadership. Nine Northeast and Mid-Atlantic governors and the mayor of Washington, D.C. announced that they will move forward with a plan that prioritizes clean transportation and ambitious climate goals.
Read more: https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/423159-states-make-climate-policies-a-2019-priority?source=Snapzu

Beastly tales from the medieval bestiary

In Disney’s The Lion King, little Simba grows up to become the ‘King of Beasts’, but did you ever wonder where the whole idea of the lion as king of beasts comes from? The answer lies in the medieval bestiary, along with a host of other wondrous and exciting discoveries.
Read more: https://www.bl.uk/medieval-english-french-manuscripts/articles/beastly-tales-from-the-medieval-bestiary?source=Snapzu

Mom Busts Son Using Alexa to Solve His Math Homework

If you got an Amazon Alexa device for Christmas, you might want to keep a closer eye on the wily kids in your house. Last week, a New Jersey mom caught her son red-handed using the virtual assistant to cheat on his math homework.
Read more: https://gizmodo.com/mom-busts-son-using-alexa-to-solve-his-math-homework-1831359325?source=Snapzu

Italy passes budget after EU standoff

Italy's parliament has approved a revised budget for 2019, amid opposition complaints that it was dictated by the EU. The country's populist government had originally vowed to push through costly campaign promises including a universal basic income. But in October, the European Commission raised concerns about the impact of such spending on Italy's debt levels.
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-46710472?source=Snapzu

Apple still considering North Carolina campus, report suggests

The 281-acre plot of land in Wake County, which Apple purportedly considered for a new campus earlier this year, was this week sold to a recently established LLC called Acute Investments, reports WRAL Tech Wire. Scott Levitan, CEO of the Research Triangle Foundation, confirmed the sale concluded this week, but would not comment further on the deal. Apple is not officially attached to the purchase, but R. Bruce Thompson, a lobbyist connected to the tech giant, was named in the public documents. Thompson is Apple's local arbitrator when the company negotiates government incentives related to local job recruitment, the report said.
Read more: https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/12/28/apple-still-considering-north-carolina-campus-report-suggests?source=Snapzu

Chinese scientist who allegedly created the first genetically engineered babies is being detained

The Chinese scientist who shocked the world with claims of creating the first genetically engineered babies is being detained in the Chinese city of Shenzhen, according to a report in The New York Times. 
Read more: https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/29/chinese-scientist-who-allegedly-created-the-first-genetically-engineered-babies-is-being-detained/?source=Snapzu

The oral history of the Hampsterdance: The twisted true story of one of the world's first memes

What started 20 years ago in Nanaimo, B.C. spawned hit songs, worldwide LOLs and a giant hairball of drama.
Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/arts/the-oral-history-of-the-hampsterdance-the-twisted-true-story-of-one-of-the-world-s-first-memes-1.4958325?source=Snapzu

8 Weirdest Presidential Nicknames

Most of us know about “Tricky Dick,” but can you identify “The Grand Wrestler” or “Big Steve”?
Read more: https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2018/06/8-weirdest-presidential-nicknames/?source=Snapzu

A List of Women Authors from the Ancient World

I am reposting this list for International Women’s day. I would also like to ask for help from anyone who would like to aid in creating individual posts for each of the names in this list.
Read more: https://sententiaeantiquae.com/2018/03/08/a-list-of-women-authors-from-the-ancient-world/?source=Snapzu

Russian teenagers have been using pictures of a retired US general for target practice

The Russians do not like Robert Scales one bit, and that's not just in the halls of the Kremlin. According to the Moscow Times, Russian students participating in a charity-sponsored "air rifle shooting competition" in the country's Urals region were invited to take aim at a photo of the retired U.S. Army major general instead of the conventional rifle target.
Read more: https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-students-use-retired-us-generals-face-for-target-practice-2018-12?source=Snapzu

Same-sex Navy couple faces backlash for re-creating iconic WWII kiss: 'We're just showing our love for each other'

A military couple reenacted the classic WW II kiss between a sailor and a nurse after a seven-month deployment. On Dec. 21, sailor Bryan Woodington, 33, stepped off the USS The Sullivans at Naval Station Mayport in Jacksonville, Fla., eager to greet Kenneth, his husband of one year. According to News 4 Jax, Bryan was one of 300 sailors returning to their families after seven months in the Persian Gulf and Europe.
Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/sex-navy-couple-recreates-iconic-ww-ii-kiss-faces-backlash-just-showing-love-195005876.html?source=Snapzu

Elon Musk's Loop tunnel relies on century-old roller coaster tech

The wooden Leap-the-Dips amusement park ride in Altoona, Pennsylvania, is the oldest roller coaster still running in the United States. Built in 1902, it became a National Historic Landmark in 1996. It's known as a side-friction roller coaster, a type so outmoded that only a handful of vintage amusement parks worldwide still have one. The key to the ride is a set of wheels that roll and bounce against a vertical plane to keep the cars on their track.
Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/vintage-roller-coaster-fans-see-familiar-tech-elon-musk-s-n951311?source=Snapzu

Will North Korea disarm? Keep your eyes on wild card Trump

This has been a banner year for summitry on the Korean peninsula with the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics as the precursor. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un held multiple meetings with South Korean president Moon Jae-in and Chinese President Xi Jinping, while Donald Trump met Kim briefly in Singapore, a first for a sitting US president. Now it’s all about maintaining the momentum. If Trump’s remarks reflect policy, we have gone from “fire and fury” to “love” and the present policy of contradiction. Denuclearisation is on hold, hostage to sanctions and human rights concerns. Can we find a way out of the cul-de-sac in 2019?
Read more: https://m.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/united-states/article/2179681/will-north-korea-disarm-may-depend-how-us-and?source=Snapzu

Russia’s New Hypersonic Missile Travels Nearly Two Miles a Second

“Zircon” would likely be unstoppable by today’s cutting edge air defenses.
Read more: https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/research/a25684396/zircon-hypersonic-missile/?source=Snapzu

British Doctors May Soon Prescribe Art, Music, Dance, Singing Lessons

Campaign is expected to launch across the entire U.K. by 2023
Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/british-doctors-may-soon-prescribe-art-music-dance-singing-lessons-180970750/?source=Snapzu

If You Care About the Plastics Crisis, Stop Eating Seafood

Plastic Planet is a series on the global plastics crisis that evaluates the environmental and human costs and considers possible solutions to this devastating man-made problem. In this op-ed, Kenny Torrella of Mercy for Animals explains how the seafood industry is harming the environment.
Read more: https://www.teenvogue.com/story/how-the-seafood-industry-is-polluting-the-ocean?verso=true?source=Snapzu

Army looks for a few good robots, sparks industry battle

The Army is looking for a few good robots. Not to fight — not yet, at least — but to help the men and women who do. These robots aren’t taking up arms, but the companies making them have waged a different kind of battle. At stake is a contract worth almost half a billion dollars for 3,000 backpack-sized robots that can defuse bombs and scout enemy positions. Competition for the work has spilled over into Congress and federal court.
Read more: https://www.apnews.com/5ab30e91e7174195b598a7379607b191?source=Snapzu

We need to rethink our moral obligations to create a better world

Our collective overuse and misuse of antibiotics is accelerating resistance to these universal drugs, leaving people increasingly vulnerable to infections that can no longer be treated. This applies not only to the use of antibiotics in human medicine, but also in animal industries. Antibiotic resistance is an example of a collective action problem. These are problems where what is individually rational leads to a collectively undesirable outcome.
Read more: https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-rethink-our-moral-obligations-to-create-a-better-world-93286?source=Snapzu

Social worker left surprise $11M to children's charities

Alan Naiman was known for an unabashed thriftiness that veered into comical, but even those closest to him had no inkling of the fortune that he quietly amassed and the last act that he had long planned. The Washington state social worker died of cancer this year at age 63, leaving most of a surprising $11 million estate to children's charities that help the poor, sick, disabled and abandoned. The amount baffled the beneficiaries and his best friends, who are lauding Naiman as the anniversary of his death approaches in January.
Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/news/social-worker-left-surprise-11m-childrens-charities-064826001.html?source=Snapzu

TSA to deploy more floppy-ear dogs because they're less scary than pointy-ear dogs

In its effort to make the airport security screening process faster, the Transportation Security Administration is employing new high-tech baggage scanners, facial-recognition cameras and “automated lanes” to eliminate passenger gridlock. But TSA Administrator David Pekoske said the agency is also making at least one new change to reduce traveler stress: deploying more floppy-ear dogs, rather than pointy-ear dogs, to sniff out explosives in public areas.
Read more: https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-travel-briefcase-tsa-dogs-20181228-story.html?source=Snapzu

Deadly Hepatitis A Outbreaks Are Exposing Crumbling U.S. Public Health Infrastructure

Kristi Haynes knew she had a problem when her eyes turned the color of traffic paint. Haynes had been feeling strangely tired, but she didn’t have many opportunities to look at herself in a mirror because she’d been homeless for a few months. Her fiance noticed her yellow eyes and freaked out. And that’s how Haynes knew she had caught the disease so many of her friends already had: hepatitis A.
Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/deadly-hepatitis-a-outbreaks-are-exposing-crumbling-us-public-health-infrastructure/ar-BBRwvSi?ocid=spartandhp?source=Snapzu

911 emergency services go down across the US after CenturyLink outage

911 emergency services in several states across the U.S. remain down after a massive outage at a CenturyLink data center. The outage began after 12pm ET on Thursday, according to CenturyLink’s status page, and continues to cause disruption across 911 call centers
Read more: https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/28/911-service-outage-centurylink/?source=Snapzu

A History of Flavoring Food With Beaver Butt Juice

No, castoreum is not a cheap substitute for strawberries; it’s luxe, artisanal secretions from a beaver's rear end.
Read more: https://munchies.vice.com/en_us/article/a3m885/a-history-of-flavoring-food-with-beaver-butt-juice?source=Snapzu

7 New Slang Words Added to the Dictionary in 2018

Each year, dictionaries like Merriam-Webster add a few new words to their lexical listings.
Read more: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/slang-words-2018/?source=Snapzu

Universal basic income had a rough 2018

Some of the biggest and most promising experiments were plagued by delays and shutdowns. The idea is that all citizens receive a set amount of money from the government to cover food, housing, and clothing, without regard to income or employment status. This minimum stipend can be supplemented with wages from work. Advocates say it will help fight poverty by giving people the flexibility to find work and strengthen their safety net, or that it offers a way to support people who might be negatively affected by automation.
Read more: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612640/universal-basic-income-had-a-rough-2018/?source=Snapzu

Gun-related Deaths Have Decreased Overall American Life Expectancy

In 2016, the last year for which the CDC provides numbers, 35,353 people died from gun injuries, the majority of them suicides. In other words, out of every 100,000 people living in the US that year, 12 were killed by a gun, compared to 11 in 2015 and 10 in 2014. “But mortality rates don’t show you how much of your life is lost,” says Bindu Kalesan, a Boston University assistant professor of community health sciences. “Who is dying young, and who is dying old?”
Read more: http://www.bu.edu/research/articles/gun-related-deaths-decreased-american-life-expectancy/?source=Snapzu

Most Americans would rather spend the $5 billion Trump is demanding for the border wall on infrastructure, education, or healthcare

As the partial government shutdown drags on into its sixth day, President Donald Trump has remained steadfast in his demands that $5 billion for a wall along the US-Mexico border be included in any package to funding and reopening the government. "Have the Democrats finally realized that we desperately need Border Security and a Wall on the Southern Border," Trump tweeted Thursday. "Need to stop Drugs, Human Trafficking,Gang Members & Criminals from coming into our Country."
Read more: https://www.businessinsider.com/government-shutdown-poll-ocasio-cortez-ideas-for-trump-border-wall-money-2018-12?utm_source=reddit.com?source=Snapzu

U.S. consumer confidence posted its sharpest decline in more than three years in December

A measure of U.S. consumer confidence posted its sharpest decline in more than three years in December, rattling investors already nervous about the prospect that a global economic slowdown was spilling over into the United States. In a sign households were growing more worried about the economy, the Conference Board on Thursday said its consumer confidence index fell this month by 8.3 points to a reading of 136.4, the largest one-month drop since July 2015.
Read more: https://stockmarketnews.today/2018/12/27/u-s-consumer-confidence-posted-its-sharpest-decline-in-more-than-three-years-in-december/?source=Snapzu

Michelle & Barack Obama Are The Most Admired People In America

Nearly two years after leaving the White House, Michelle and Barack Obama still hold the hearts of the American people. A new Gallup poll released Thursday found that the former first couple are the most admired woman and man in the country. Michelle, who is currently promoting her bestselling memoir Becoming, dethroned former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton for the first time in 17 years. Clinton — who's also been in the public eye as first lady, U.S. senator...
Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/michelle-barack-obama-most-admired-193749091.html?source=Snapzu

Inmate found knitting prison warders' uniforms during surprise raid

Correctional Services has discovered, during a raid at Leeuwkop Prison in Johannesburg, that an inmate was making prison warders' uniforms in his cell.
Read more: http://www.sabcnews.com/sabcnews/inmate-found-knitting-prison-warders-uniforms-during-surprise-raid/?source=Snapzu

New York Sky Turns Bright Blue After Transformer Explosion

A giant plume of smoke exploded into the night sky on Thursday night in Queens, causing people across New York City to gawk in awe.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/27/nyregion/blue-sky-queens-explosion.html?source=Snapzu

President Trump’s Retreat on the Environment Is Affecting Communities Across America

In just two years, Trump has unleashed a regulatory rollback with little parallel in the past half-century.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/26/us/politics/donald-trump-environmental-regulation.html?source=Snapzu

Cell signal puts Cohen outside Prague around time of purported Russian meeting

One of Michael Cohen’s mobile phones briefly lit up cell towers in late summer of 2016 in the vicinity of Prague, undercutting his denials that he secretly met there with Russian officials, four people have told McClatchy.
Read more: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/investigations/article219016820.html?source=Snapzu

Earth Has a Hidden Plastic Problem—Scientists Are Hunting It Down

During a research cruise to the Sargasso Sea in fall 1971 marine biologist Ed Carpenter first noticed peculiar, white specks floating amidst the mats of brown sargassum seaweed. After some investigating he discovered they were tiny bits of plastic. He was stunned. If thousands of the broken down particles were showing up in in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, 550 miles from any mainland, he says, “I figured it’s all over the place.”
Read more: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-has-a-hidden-plastic-problem-mdash-scientists-are-hunting-it-down/?source=Snapzu

Growing up poor has a lasting impact on brain development, study shows

Growing up in a less well-off family may negatively impact the brain, according to research showing how socioeconomic status can have a lasting impact on a person’s development. US researchers found brain regions responsible for learning, language and emotional development tended to be more complex in people whose parents were educated to a higher level or who worked in professional rather than manual jobs.
Read more: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/childhood-poverty-brain-development-growing-up-links-economic-factors-a8698251.html?source=Snapzu

Japan to restart commercial whale hunts

One conservation group warns that the move shows "a troubling disregard for international rule".
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46682976?source=Snapzu

Late 1890s - A Trip Through Paris, France (speed corrected w/ added sound)

A collection of high quality remastered prints from the dawn of film taken in Belle Époque-era Paris, France from 1896-1900. Slowed down footage to a natural rate and added in sound for ambiance.
Read more: https://snapzu.com/Apolatia/late-1890s-a-trip-through-paris-france-speed-corrected-w-added-sound?source=Snapzu

Top Amazon boss privately advised US government on web portal worth billions to tech firm

Exclusive: Emails show how tech firm has tried to gain influence and potentially shape lucrative government contracts
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/dec/26/amazon-anne-rung-government-services-authority?source=Snapzu

Trump is first president in 15 years to not visit troops during Christmas period

Donald Trump is the first U.S. president to not visit troops over the Christmas holiday since 2002. On Tuesday morning, Trump continued the presidential tradition of telephoning military personnel, using the occasion to address the partial government shutdown over funding for his long- promised wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. But did not visit with any troops in person.
Read more: https://www.newsweek.com/trump-first-president-15-years-not-visit-troops-during-christmas-period-1271308?source=Snapzu